


Kill the Moon (Turn Out the Sun)

by keeponshouting



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Horror, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-21
Updated: 2013-06-02
Packaged: 2017-12-06 01:32:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 19,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/730117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/keeponshouting/pseuds/keeponshouting
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"All ambient noise will hush and halt in the main rooms of the Musain when the voice begins speaking and he knows that.  Twenty-three hours of radio static and an hour of reverence are how his breed of revolutionary has come to recognize their own.  If you believe in the cause, you are always listening, always waiting."</p>
<p>In which Enjolras leads a dystopian society to revolution, Grantaire is both his greatest inspiration and his greatest obstacle, and the real monsters are not the ones hiding in the dark.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Radio Bomb

**Author's Note:**

> Sci-fi dystopian horror, anyone? Talk about a complete departure from everything else I've written since getting back into fanfiction but, really, horror is sort of my bag. I don't actually know how often this will get updated, seeing as I have... no plans whatsoever for where it's going, but uh first full-length chapter should be up soon. I've just been listening to too much Matthew Good and I needed to write something dark and this happened.

It's a close call but it always is. That's one thing that he can always count on, that keeps him going. He has the patrol patterns memorized, has a fly on the wall in both the parliament chamber and the precinct, knows when things are happening and where they're happening, and he knows, with a painful certainty, that he would almost have to try to ever get caught but still.  It is always a close call – always – because there are eyes in the sky and they are never sleeping but he knows, better than anyone, when they're blinking.

 He knows that there is only one that never blinks.

 "I swear to God, Enjolras, if you were any more of an adrenaline junkie these days, you'd be Bahorel."

 He doesn't have the liberty to laugh at that but it gives him pause to smile while no one can see him and he peels the backing off of sticky, red circuitry.

 In his ear, there’s the rumble rustle of motion and Bossuet sighing, a long-suffering sound. Then there are words, quiet, undirected, filling the static silence by thinking out loud. "We've got Combeferre three blocks down but he's in hiding right now. Courfeyrac's in-crowd, so that would look suspicious. Oh hey. Speaking of Bahorel, he and Feuilly are working the bar over the Musain.  That’s one level and a half block down. If you can get to the conduit--"

He slaps his star into place and a tap of his finger against his microphone is all the agreement they need.

 

[ _Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to your Radio Bomb._ ]

 

"The hell took you so long?"

Combeferre drops from the ceiling as quietly as possible and offers the question a serene sort of smile. "You ask as if I'm not the first to arrive."

Feuilly chuckles in the background as Bahorel rolls his eyes and tosses his friend a clean t-shirt. The man's right, of course. It's still just the three of them. Their number should grow any second but that's not the point and they all know it.

Feuilly flicks the wheel of a lighter and watches the ducts and piping above them, standing on the trap door that will soon take them below, while they wait to the sound of a crackling radio.

 

[ _Sorry for the wait today but the weather's been partly cloudy and we had our eye on a little black rain cloud coming in from the east ._ ]

 

Enjolras is the last to lower himself into the little store room. He usually is and, when he's not, they tend to have bigger things to worry about anyway. In the background of quiet motion and the exchanging of fresh daily wear for urban camouflage, the radio still crackles, sending a shriek of feedback into his ear.

"Agh! Damnit, Enjolras!" Bossuet's voice is distant, like his mouth isn't next to the microphone anymore. "If you’re safe would you turn your headset down already? I don't want to be deaf before he broadcasts. Christ Jesus."

Enjolras huffs something half laugh, half apology and turns his own microphone off as Bahorel stuffs their dirty clothes into a duffle and Feuilly lifts the door for them to slip from one cramped space to another, one by one.  It takes a grand total of five minutes.  Then they can surreptitiously begin exiting their glorified janitor’s closet, carefully using the flow of bodies, some familiar and some strange, to assist them in reentering the hustle and bustle of their home fields.

Last to drop as usual, vents closed and locked behind him, Enjolras lets the others do as they will and pulls out an old, plastic chair from the small radio table in the corner.  There he sits.  There he waits.  All ambient noise will hush and halt in the main rooms of the Musain when the voice begins speaking and he knows that.  Twenty-three hours of radio static and an hour of reverence are how his breed of revolutionary has come to recognize their own.  If you believe in the cause, you are always listening, always waiting.

Tonight there isn't much of the latter necessary before the static goes quiet, the volume beyond the door quickly following in deference to one of the few things that can ever truly silence every last one of them.  Them:  the friends.  Them:  the people. Enjolras tips his head back and crosses his arms, heart still somewhere just short of pounding, and breath bated as he waits for that familiar distortion of voice.

_Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to your Radio Bomb._

He lets his eyes close, only vaguely aware that, once again, he’s faintly smiling.

 

[ _Today is day twenty-three, year five of this bloody occupation and reports say there's a nasty storm brewing and a cold front coming in from the north any day but—  Yes, children, quiet and listen, there is a but and let me tell you. The unblinking eye in the sky has some good news for you, kiddies, because we've seen signs that a tropical wind might be rising.  So hold onto your heads and follow the stars. This is going to be a ride to remember._ ]


	2. No Man of Action

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally started writing this fic because The Simplest Things was being difficult and then suddenly TST decided to start flooding out instead. So I'm a liar and this took way longer to get together than it should have but whatever. Slice of life. Things will be explained more and also probably be more interesting in subsequent chapters.

[ _Goodnight, boys and girls, both those fair and those revolting.  Sweet dreams to all until reality wakes._ ]

They start their celebration without him, as they always do, and Enjolras makes his way into the fray with minimal fanfare, as he always does.  There is a seat saved for him at their back table, between Combeferre and the chair that Courfeyrac generally occupies when they all dine together, often shared with whatever young lady or gentleman has been lucky enough to garner his attention at the time.  It’s no real surprise, however, to note that he isn’t currently there.

“At the bar,” Combeferre greets him, nodding in that very direction.

Whether he means Courfeyrac or something more interesting requires Enjolras to look and, to be honest, what he finds is as unsurprising as his friend’s empty chair.  “Flirting with Prouvaire again.”

“You know him.  Nothing if not determined.”  Leaning back, Combeferre puts himself closer to his companion and leader under the guise of attempting to clean his glasses, quiet for a moment and smiling as they both watch their friend work his charm.  The bartender who has his attention is slight and fair and cheerful and has long since stopped blushing at the blatant flirtation.  Combeferre chuckles before he adds in an undertone, “He thinks we should induct Jehan into Les Amis, you know.  Says it would simplify the process of translating your thoughts into something normal people can both read and remember.”

Enjolras can’t help but scoff at that.  “Normal people?  Are those his words or yours?”

“I’m paraphrasing.”  Combeferre just goes on with that smile as he sets his glasses back against the bridge of his nose.  “It may, however, be worth considering.”

The look he receives is somewhat dubious.

He mostly ignores it, not particularly hurried in his assurance.  “Not so much due to any fault of your own, mind.”  Still smiling, he glances toward where Bahorel and Feuilly have taken over a pool table and reaches for one of the many bottles scattered about the table.  “Jehan doesn’t just have a way with words.  He also has a way with people, not to mention some potentially very useful connections.”

Dubious gives way to full-on doubtful and Enjolras crosses his arms over his chest as he scans the room.  “Have you become aware of some connections beyond the obvious or is there some new bit of information I seem to have missed?”

“Eponine knows the lower levels like the back of her hand.  Having her on our side would be tremendously helpful and you know it.”

“That I concede.”

“And Grantaire—”

“Is a drunk.”  There is no room for argument as Enjolras turns his eyes back toward the man beside him, blazing with barely contained fury, expression a study in disdain.  “We hardly have time to work around vices, Combeferre, let alone doubt.  Courfeyrac’s libido has made things difficult enough in the past but at least he believes in our cause and has managed to build a network, however questionable.  Grantaire is the greatest waste of intellect and raw potential that I have ever seen below Parliament.”

Combeferre simply sighs and raises his hands in a gesture of peace, though not surrender.  “I can’t contend against the drunk part but his intellect isn’t exactly wasting away when he’s successfully pointing out the holes in your arguments.  How many pamphlets and programs have we edited at the last minute because the two of you went a round the night before publication?  The man’s a cynic, yes, but he’s hardly useless.”

As if on cue, the door opens to double the sounds of the café with the sounds of the street and the way that every member of their team snaps a moment’s attention toward the newcomers might give them away if they were anywhere else.  In the Musain, however, there are very few patrons who do not maintain such habits.  It is just one of the many reasons why Enjolras had selected the place as their central location.  Not only was it convenient in a physical capacity but the clientele was almost entirely sympathetic to, if not supportive of, their efforts.

Almost.

The man currently stepping out of their conversation and into the café was by far the most glaring of the few exceptions to that rule.  It was a fact which they had learned fairly quickly and one which none of them particularly understood, though everyone but Enjolras had come to the conclusion that it was just as well to leave the situation alone.  Grantaire was generally harmless and, though he openly mocked them, his direct interactions with most of Les Amis had always been friendly.  Even when he chose to turn some of his energy into an argument with Enjolras, he was rarely anything less than pleasant about it, which was perhaps one of the things that ruffled their fearless leader’s feathers the most about him.  How exactly does one win an argument when the other party’s response to every word is cheerful indifference?

The rare arguments that ended in shouting at one another were the ones that Enjolras really knew how to handle.  They were also almost entirely fruitless but, when it came down to it, that was often beside the point.  On the days when it got that heated, just getting Grantaire to rile tended to feel like success enough.  It didn’t matter that their voices overlapped and their words tangled or that everyone in the café was staring at them or that their ability to bring up the same points of argument in tandem was absolutely uncanny.  Most of all, it didn’t matter that neither Jehan nor Eponine could keep up with their translations, which left Grantaire, quite literally, ninety-five percent deaf to every word that Enjolras said.

And that was it, the very heart of the issue.  That was why Enjolras took such great offence to Grantaire’s cynicism and doubt and could not leave well enough alone.  There was simply too much to be said, too much to express through translators.  He could not settle for losing at any time, to any man, but least of all to one who could just as easily end a conversation by looking away, who was always watching his mouth rather than looking him in the eye, a man who should have been, by all rights, more angry than even Enjolras, more angry than the leader of the most active and respected rebel forces in the world.  Grantaire was the most vivid example of the people for whom Les Amis were fighting and if he was so steadily against them—

Enjolras turns his attention to scowling at their table as he hears Bahorel calling Eponine over to play a round.

Combeferre just empties what little is left in his bottle and waits.

“I will never understand it!” is how the speech begins tonight.  This time, at least, Enjolras keeps his voice down as he goes on.  “The Able Bodies Act passes, destroys so many people, him amongst them, and he does nothing.  He simply argues that there is no point, that nothing _can_ be done.  The Initiative remains, Parliament refuses to revoke their decision, offers no compensation for damages, leaves him and everyone like him to rot and here he sits, night after night, drinking himself to death and laughing in the faces of anyone who tries to help him or change anything.  How can a person even live like that?”

That last word is accompanied by a violent hand gesture toward the bar, the direction of it remarkably well aimed considering that Enjolras hadn’t watched the man in question take his seat.  Grantaire takes the same place every night, though, so perhaps it is slightly less of a surprise than it could be.  Not that it matters.  The fact is just an interesting tidbit for Combeferre to observe and file away as he watches his friend glare at the cynic’s back.  In the end, the glaring is far less entertaining to watch than Eponine’s brother attempting to climb onto Courfeyrac’s shoulders without taking the both of them down, stool and all.

 

It’s going on one in the morning and the number of people at the Musain has slowly but surely dwindled down to Les Amis, still at their back table, and a scattered few others, most of whom are already varying degrees of drunk.  Bossuet and Joly had joined them once they had finished wrapping up surveillance and Musichetta had appeared beside them not long after, informing them that Marius had made it safely topside for his dinner with Cosette and her father.  After thoroughly trouncing Bahorel and Feuilly at pool, Eponine has taken up her duty at the bar and Jehan has been relieved to join Grantaire for a drink or two, though he spends most of his time watching Courfeyrac do little magic tricks for Gavroche instead.  Tonight is a quiet night, as it is meant to be.

Combeferre refuses to let Enjolras talk revolution after a mission until everyone has had their rest and the stir they’ve caused has settled down.  The latter part of the deal is rarely heeded, of course, but they will all have their time to recuperate before they begin their next set of plans.  Their program, physically planted in various portions of the topside cyber structure, will be setting off alarms in the Precinct and erasing information from the Initiative database for weeks.  All in all, it has been one of their greater successes and they deserve a moment to be content.  These are the nights that they live for.

Across the table, Bossuet leans an elbow on the table, chin in hand as he watches Joly carefully rolling cigarettes.  Musichetta, meanwhile, has leaned back into her chair, legs kicked up across both men’s laps as she watches Feuilly, who is in the process of winning yet another round of pool against yet another good-natured drunk.  He was abandoned by Bahorel long ago, his best friend having wandered off to flirt with a table of young ladies just off work from one of the upper level textile shops, but such is the nature of their relationship.  Such it has always been and such it will always be.

Combeferre takes a lazy sip from his drink and watches them all with a somewhat fatherly air of fondness.

“All right, ladies and gentlemen.”  It’s Eponine and the clock above her head reads ten ’til.  She doesn’t even have to say the rest.  They all know and every last person in the room begins the process of moving themselves and their company on.

“Hey ho, kids!”  Bahorel appears at their table, snagging as many empty bottles as he can fit into his big hands.  “Poland and I are heading out to make sure these young ladies get home safely.  We’ll see you tomorrow.”  Then he’s off again, an arm hooking Feuilly by the elbow as he goes.  Together, they dump their garbage in the bin, receive a grateful farewell from the bartender, and hold the double doors open as they escort the group of giggling girls back out to the street.  Feuilly spares a moment to flash a not at all apologetic grin back in at the rest of his friends.

Joly lights a cigarette and keeps it between his lips as he slides out from under Musichetta’s feet.  “Time for us to get moving as well, I think.”

Bossuet hums in agreement and ’Chetta lets him stand before sighing and letting him pull her up as well.  “I’d just got comfortable,” she says, her tone feigning a whine, though she follows the words with a kiss on his cheek and makes no complaint when Joly hands her a stack of plates to take over to the bar.  There is no room for complaint when she’s rolling her eyes and catching Joly’s lips to distract him from the glob of someone else’s leftovers that he’s somehow got on his hand.

It’s a nightly ritual, helping clean up the mess that they’ve made, and every last one of them takes part until every last table is cleared without the café’s limited staff having to even lift a finger.  Eponine always thanks them and takes the dishes into the back.  Jehan smiles, bright and cheerful, and leaves his cleaning rag on the table to give them each a hug before they leave.  Neither staff nor one of the straggling friends, Grantaire simply finishes his last drink and waits until they’re all making their way to the door before he gets up to tie off the trash.

“You boys coming back to mine?” Musichetta is in the process of asking when Combeferre and Enjolras join their friends outside, Courfeyrac having opted to stay behind and help finish the cleaning.  She’s got one arm hooked around Joly’s waist and the other hooked around Bossuet’s elbow, the former huffing a small plume of smoke out his nose as he reaches out to stop the latter from tumbling all three to the ground.

Combeferre smiles as he pushes his glasses back up his nose.  “Day off tomorrow.  Enjoy yourselves.”

Neither of the men have time enough to do much more than wave and call back a quick farewell, before their lady is dragging them off down the street.

“And then there were two.”  Still smiling, Combeferre turns toward where he expects his friend and leader to be waiting and finds himself blinking in confusion when the space is, in fact, quite empty.  “Er.  Enjolras?”

In the end, he has to spin a full 180 to find himself pleasantly surprised by a sight that he plans to file away but never speak of.  It’s a plan which makes it just as well that Enjolras doesn’t even look back at the sound of his name.  He is, after all, too busy making sure that he’s held the door open far enough for Grantaire to lug the garbage bags out with minimal interference and, while Combeferre knows that it is likely done as much out of pity as anything else, he feels it is at least a step in the right direction.


	3. Put Out Your Lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which there are some explosions, some people are Very Angry, and Joly gets to be a badass.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter sort of snuck itself into place in that way where you just start typing and let whatever wants to happen next just happen. Very choppy but whatever. I like it better than what I originally had planned so enjoy.

The lights go down at midnight and, by the time the workmen get them back—

“The entirety of the Core has gone red.”

Javert stares at his radio, expression unreadable, and blatantly ignores the odd looks his men are giving him.  “Excuse me?”

“Sir,” the voice coming from the speaker tries again.  “The Core.  It’s red.”

Javert scowls.  “Is this meant to be a joke?”

There is a long moment in which the young man on the other end remains silent – perhaps attempting to determine the best course of action in this situation or perhaps simply wondering how likely he is to lose his job if he fails to handle even the simple task of expressing the problem properly.  When he tries again, his words come out more slowly, as if he were picking his way through some sort of mine field.  “This is not a joke, sir.  The Core has, uh, literally gone, well, red.  It looks like it’s a, um, a covering of some sort?  The mechanic says it’s sealing everything off so the current can’t get through and—”  He pauses, takes a deep and audible breath.  “And the color is spreading.”  A beat.  “Sir.”

The explosions start at noon.

 

“They’re going to frame us for this, you realize.”

Combeferre’s voice is steady and reasonable, a perfect balance to the fury that is Enjolras pacing.  Courfeyrac leans against the wall, an ear at the door, and watches without his usual smile.  This is not how any of this was meant to go, at least on their end, but there are many who would have other ideas and they know it.  The problem is that they need to know who.

Enjolras scowls, eyes wild, and lets them both see a part of him that their other friends rarely witness.  He is raw and his bite is vicious.  “Have either of you spoken with Feuilly?  Are we certain that it _wasn’t_ ours?”

“It wasn’t.”  Combeferre sighs, leans back in his chair, fingers toying idly with a pen.  “We have checked and rechecked our trigger and timing sequence – Feuilly, Bossuet, and myself – and both are perfectly set.  Ours will go off twenty-four hours after the release of the virus, no sooner, no later, and the virus itself is still under lock and key.”  He leans forward, elbows on the table, and thumbs his glasses back up to the bridge of his nose.  “Unfortunately, no one outside of our circle will know that.”

Their leader’s nostrils flare.

When Courfeyrac finally pipes in, it’s with the most carefully placed words that he can muster.  “None of our targets have ever been residential.  The _people_ will know that.”

He sees a flicker of something on his friends’ faces and Enjolras exhales, breath long and steady.

Combeferre waits only a few blessed moments before quietly noting, “It’s not necessarily the people I’m worried about.”

 

Bahorel has never liked the duct work and conduit system.  It’s too narrow, too cramped, doesn’t leave room enough for a man to think, let alone function.  Feuilly teases him about it sometimes, calls it irrational, says he’s just claustrophobic.  They both know better but it helps Feuilly keep together better under pressure if he pretends that he’s not bothered by all of the exact same things.

Caught outside of them, the pipelines are the most convenient escape route.

Caught inside of them, there is no escape.

“All right, Laigle.”  Bahorel mutters, using his shoulder to make sure his headset is on right.  “I’m at the bottom.  Do you want visual?”

After a moment, a voice that is obviously doing its best not to panic crackles into his ear.  “Got it.  I’m running the schematic now.”

Bahorel takes a deep breath, lets it expand his chest to full girth, releases it slowly, through his nose.  Then he stills as the broken duct that he’s strapped into sags just a little bit further.  Christ, he hopes his anchor holds at the head of this tunnel.  The edges of torn steel up ahead look like some nightmarish shark’s teeth and he doesn’t much enjoy the thought of sliding through them.  Barely visible across the chasm they’re meant to be mending, Feuilly is equally strapped in just beyond equally twisted metal and he doesn’t flinch (he does) when the noise of it howls and echoes into darkness.

The conduits are tarnished silver serpents and they are trapped inside one’s belly.

“Get us _through this shit_ , 8-ball.”

His ear piece hisses, a chair rolls and squeaks.  “Just hold on, ok?  I’m--  There are a million things going right now.  You’re not the only team in the conduits, we’ve got structural damage from Alpha down to Gamma, Parliament just announced an emergency session, and the Precinct is harassing the rescue squads.”

Feuilly clicks in.  “It’s all right, Bossuet.  Take your time.”

Bahorel wants to shout something vulgar, maybe crack a mean joke or maybe just scream.  He can’t do any of those, though, can’t even half breathe, and the suspense and suspension both are killing him.  “If I die here, Poland, I’m coming back to haunt you.”

A speck of light in the darkness, his friend huffs a laugh and a shush.  “No one’s dying today, ziomek.”

When Bossuet starts reeling off instructions in their ears, Bahorel breathes deep and says nothing about the hundreds of people probably already dead and dying above them.

 

Joly stands his ground, eyes narrowed and arms crossed, and he will not budge.

“This is a criminal investigation,” the new officer repeats what each of the others have said before in their attempts to move him, though a note of uncertainty has begun to creep into this one’s voice.  “You are not authorized to—”

“Safe Citizens Act, Article 114,” Joly states, as he has done so many times.  “As long as there are individuals on the premises incapable of removing themselves from said premises without assistance, my people and I have legal preauthorization to be on site.  Technically,” he spits the words like acid, a finger jabbing forward, hardly an inch between its tip and the officer’s chest, “given Article 115, I should be the one demanding that you lot either help us move these citizens to safety or at least stand a proper guard to keep on-lookers out of the way but, seeing as you’re all too interested in repeating this same pointless argument to do your own jobs—”

“Criminal investigation supersedes—”

If it weren’t for Musichetta hooking Joly’s elbows behind his own back, the officer, now lying on the rubble-littered ground and bleeding from the nose, would be in far more pain than he is already.  Other officers appear to defend their colleague.  Joly’s contingent have seen this too many times to stop the far more important work that they are doing.

“Nothing,” the doctor snarls, “supersedes the safety of the people.”

Musichetta tugs him back a step as the officers shift, angry and nervous.

Joly steadies himself with a deep breath and relaxes just enough to be released.  “Arrest me when this is all said and done,” he says, voice deceptively calm as he brushes a hand over the front of his shirt.  “I couldn’t care less about that.  Believe me.  Until this site is completely swept for civilians, however, you’d best either keep it clear, as you’re meant to do, or else you’d best fuck off.”

 

“We could set up cots in here and—”

“Are you sure your father won’t mind?”

Cosette pauses a moment to stare at Marius as if he’s grown a second head before she finally smiles brightly, hand resting against his cheek.  “Oh, darling, Papa only gives you such a hard time because he wants the best for me, you know?”  With a quick kiss to his cheek, she spins away, dress fluttering with his heart.  “He’s always been very kind and generous to those less fortunate and we hardly use this house at the moment so it really might as well be put to some good cause.”

Marius can’t help smiling, lost in his own dreaming as he follows her from room to room, only half listening to her planning out how best to turn her childhood home into a shelter.  She is so beautiful and perfect, a songbird of safety and an angel of joy.  He could almost forget the world of danger that awaits him the moment he delves back into the fray, his own world below.

“The neighbors won’t like it,” she’s saying, still beaming, eyes bright with mischief as she turns back to him, “but to be entirely honest, I’ve never cared much for these neighbors.”

When he laughs, she laughs, and Marius just wants to kiss her.  “I’ll call Enjolras.  He’ll know the best way to go about making your plan a legal endeavor.”

She’s set to work, clearing up clutter and organizing necessities, before he’s even got his phone out of his pocket.

 

Eponine skids down the slope of what was formerly her kitchen floor, eyes wider and brighter than Jehan can ever remember seeing them.

“Are you all right?”

“I’m fine, ’Ponine.  Are you?”

She nods once, the motion short and curt, then— “I need to find Gavroche.”

Suddenly Jehan knows exactly why she looks so wild and he grabs her arm, dragging her out the door and away from the rubble of what was once his apartment’s ceiling.

The rest of the building looks very much the same as their own cramped and crumbling spaces.  One neighbor is clambering over half beams to help another get their dog free.  Someone is trapped in a cupboard with an infant screaming and the three crossdressers from upstairs are trying to find the best way to get the door open, two of them still in their work skirts and spike heels.  Eponine close on his tail, Jehan leaps the stairwell railing and monkies his way down, two flights at a time.

“He didn’t come home after we closed down last night,” she calls over the noise of rattling debris and panicked voices.  “He’s got a few spots he likes to stay sometimes but—”

“You check those first.”  Jehan cuts her off as his feet hit solid ground and he reaches up to make sure she doesn’t stumble.  “I’ll check R’s place and get him in on the search, too, ok?”

Eponine ignores his offered hand as she plants herself firmly in front of him.  Her only acknowledgement is to nod again, expression gone steely.  His hand barely has time to brush her shoulder before they’re both off in opposite directions.

 

_Ladies and gentlemen—_

In the Precinct, Javert chokes in the midst of barking orders and joins his men in staring at the loud speaker in the corner.

_—boys and girls._

In Combeferre’s office, three sets of eyes snap toward the desk radio in unison and Enjolras lets his phone drift away from his ear.

_This is your Radio Bomb._

In the Conduit, Bossuet’s voice is drowned out and Bahorel stops welding to lock eyes with Feuilly.

_Looks like it’s time for an early forecast today._

In the field, Joly’s hands pause over his patient for only an instant and Musichetta moves their receiver closer to the table.

_Overcast, as you may have noticed, and scattered hail or—_

In the new shelter, Cosette raises a hand to hush her sweetheart and leans out the window to commandeer the neighbor’s radio.

_Well, maybe it’s more like fire and brimstone._

In the streets, neither Eponine nor Jehan take more than a moment to pause.

_Either way, there are clouds in the heavens, little children, so remember those flashes are only lightning._

Enjolras narrows his eyes as he mutters, “Courfeyrac, start calling Les Amis.  I want everyone under the Musain or on the line in two hours.”

_Someone is dressing storms up as constellations, kiddies, and that’s no fair at all._

The Precinct is empty of all save its commander as officers pour into the streets.

_Today is day twenty-four, year five of the occupation and the unblinking eye is still waiting._


	4. Time Bomb Over Bad Lands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “The Post is out,” are the first words spoken and they break into the air like shattering glass. Every eye is on Enjolras, sat at a small table, elbows resting, fingers steepled, and gaze intent on the floor. “Parliament has made their official statement. They’ve laid blame on the Eye and its ‘conspirators’.”
> 
> Combeferre moves to pass out hardcopies of the news story then, as Courfeyrac needlessly informs them, “That means us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't even summarize this chapter. I'm too busy just being pleased with what came out.

“He’s here, ’Ponine.”

Jehan is perched on the arm of a ratty sofa, staring at the sleeping face of a boy who has no idea that his streets are crumbling to ruin above him.  In his ear, the child’s sister tries her best not to sound too worried, too afraid.  They’ve both seen things today that make finding Gavroche a relief, more of one than it has ever been before, and yet.  It’s so important to her that her armor, however it may crack, will never shatter.

Somewhere, a door creaks and boxes rattle.

“Everything seems fine down here.”  Jehan glances back at the sound of bottles clinking but no one else is in the room and he knows that.  Things echo here, off of tall ceilings and reinforced walls.  Behind R’s own artwork, above it in the places he couldn’t reach, there are medical posters and military propaganda, stern faces and obsolete warning symbols painted and peeling in chunks of faded color, monsters with the faces of men and women peering down from corners so dark he can barely see.

Jehan forces himself to look away.  “I mean, I haven’t really looked into Zeta proper,” he tells her, “and Epsilon looked like it barely shivered but Delta’s still a bit wrecked so—  All right.  We’ll see you soon just—  ’Ponine, please be careful.”

When he hangs up, he sighs, drops his hands to his lap, lets his gaze fall on the communication device burning his palm.  Five minutes later, he blinks awake, still upright and slumped around the tiny screen.  Eponine will be there soon.  Once she is, he supposes they should both get some sleep.  For now, he unplugs his phone with a tug and watches as the transmission line drops to the floor, a good few feet away.  He’d stretched it around the corner, to its limit.  There isn’t a wireless device in the world capable of getting a signal through the layers of steel and concrete above his head and that is how his host likes it but Jehan had needed to be there, watching the peace of unknowing dreams.  Even with the line in, the battery on his phone is almost dead.

He breathes in deeply, sighs out slowly, pushes himself to his feet.  There are so many memories in this place, most long forgot, and it’s hard not to love it.  No matter how sadly beautiful it is, however, it still gives Jehan the creeps.  The higher up that Parliament builds, the more the lowest levels feel like graveyards to him.  Passing through it these days, Epsilon always feels less like a living place and more like a world packed full of burnt out store front mausoleums.  People still dwell there, inhabiting the remnants of a world long abandoned, sandwiched between splintered floorboards and flickering lights, but they are different, so very different, from their brothers above them.  They survive like pack animals, like scurrying rats; they live and they love and they are painfully beautiful.  Up-Dwellers call them Roaches and R says they embrace that.  Jehan still starts at white skin and pale eyes.

“Grantaire?”  Quietly, slowly, he slips into a corridor, his voice tickling walls as it echoes away.  During the Last Great War, this place had housed soldiers.  Now it plays home to so many ghosts.

 

It is two hours after the broadcast and Les Amis are gathered in the top room of Cosette’s new shelter.  Once it was her bedroom; now it is their sanctuary.  Joly slips in with Bossuet and Musichetta close behind him and they shut the door to bring a moment’s peace.  They are all there now, a ring of statues, silent and heavy, and only their host, unused to attending, knows why they are waiting.

The quiet doesn’t last long.

“The Post is out,” are the first words spoken and they break into the air like shattering glass.  Every eye is on Enjolras, sat at a small table, elbows resting, fingers steepled, and gaze intent on the floor.  “Parliament has made their official statement.  They’ve laid blame on the Eye and its ‘conspirators’.”

Combeferre moves to pass out hardcopies of the news story then, as Courfeyrac needlessly informs them, “That means us.”

It’s Marius who pulls his lips into a grimace, staring at the page in his hand but not reading.  “But they don’t know who any of us are, do they?  What good does that do them?”

Bahorel snorts.  “They’ve no names or faces for who they’re after, no, but they’ve an idea what to look for in potential insurgents.  It’s a witch hunt, kiddo.  We’re all as good as fucked.”

Beside him, Feuilly confirms this with a scowl and Marius simply slumps against the wall.

“So what’s the plan?”  It’s Joly who eventually asks the most important of questions, situating himself by a window and cracking the shutters open as he pulls out his pipe.  “I assume you have one, if we’re all here.”

At that, Enjolras finally looks up.  “We have a plan.  Our problem now, however, is setting the stage.”

Scooting over to share Joly’s window, Feuilly hums around his cigarette.  “If you’re plan is what I think it is, we’ve got our work cut out for us.”

“Feuilly’s right.”  Still by the door, still reading through the article, Bossuet’s voice is low and steady.  “The lead-up was supposed to span the next few months for a reason.”  He glances up over the paper, brow furrowed.  “We’re nowhere near ready.”

This time the silence that surrounds them is more disconcerting.

“So,” this time it’s Cosette who calls them out of their reverie, “what do we need to do?”

Enjolras looks to Combeferre, who takes a deep breath.  “Well, first we need a fourth coder.”  He pushes his glasses up to the bridge of his nose before crossing his arms over his chest.  “Feuilly knows the concept, Bossuet knows the numbers, and I know how to make it all work together but we need someone who can simplify it.  Not to mention the fact it would be good to just have a fresh pair of eyes.  The three of us have been staring at this same sequence for the past year and, though I certainly can’t speak for my partners in crime, I myself am beginning to see it all blend together.”

Feuilly and Bossuet both nod in agreement.

“That’s a start.”  Enjolras clasps his hands together on the table as he glances to Courfeyrac.  “Do we know anyone who might fit the bill?”

The same grin that has so often caused all those gathered to worry for their personal safety now brings them a certain degree of relief, as Courfeyrac rubs his hands together.  “I know just the guy.”  Then he pauses, expression once more serious.  “I’ve got to be up-front about it, though, Chief.  You’re not going to like this.”

They all shift, nervous, as Enjolras frowns.  “Right now, Courfeyrac, our cause is more important than my personal preferences.”

Courfeyrac simply nods and begins fidgeting with his phone.

“The next step,” Combeferre continues, “is the set-up.”

Feuilly coughs and flashes Bahorel a grin.  “This’ll be where you come in.”

The other man’s eyes light up like a bonfire.

Combeferre quirks an amused brow and confirms.  “Yes.  This will be where Bahorel comes in, as well as anyone he thinks he may need for the job.  The entire point of the virus is to take down the Core and shut down Parliament.  We’re essentially going to be dissolving their programming and thereby their entire power structure from the inside out.  Our problem there is going to be distracting the necessary parties in order for someone to sneak in and get the virus physically docked, sequence running.  That means having our people on the field, keeping the Precinct busy elsewhere.  We need them spread as thin as possible without our actual goal being too terribly obvious.”

“Oh, don’t you worry about that.”  Bahorel laces his fingers, folding them out with a loud crack.  “Give me a few hours and a few more people and I’ll have those lap dogs barking up all the wrong trees, no problem.”

That said, Combeferre nods and listens to his friends’ excited murmuring for a moment before he takes off his glasses with a sigh.  “The last step sounds deceptively simple.”  Everyone goes quiet again and he pauses to wipe his lenses clean.  “We need to get our man to the Core control room which, given the fact that Bossuet has already acquired the schematics for the building, shouldn’t really be the hard part.  Figuring out where to go once he’s in, however…”

His eyes land on Enjolras and everyone knows.

“There’s a gaping hole in the center of the plan,” Combeferre tells him.  “You will be walking out of our front lines and directly into a void.  Up until the point that we lose track of you, we can make sure that everything is perfectly timed to put you at maximum advantage.  Once you’re in, all that we can promise is to give you whatever time we can manage.”

Staring out the window, Joly mutters, “This is a suicide mission.”

Musichetta rests her head on his shoulder as Bossuet takes his hand.

At his table, Enjolras presses his knuckles to his lips and lets his gaze sweep over them, tired yet unwavering, heart stretch and yet unchanged.  “If any of you wish to walk away now, no one will think the less of you for it.”

There is a new and weighted silence to their gathering but not one of them moves for the door.


	5. We're So Heavy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just want to thank everybody for reading and for all the kudos. Astonishingly, I actually know where I'm going with this fic in more than an extremely broad sense and it's nice to know that anyone other than myself is enjoying it. Next chapter will finally contain some real action, as well as actual interactions between Enjolras and Grantaire.

He remembers once, when he was a child, sitting under water and listening.  When his parents argued, it was different there, muffled, garbled, and he could only barely make out every few words.  The sounds were quieter, though still heated, seemed further away, like they were on a different world.  Then his mother had shouted his name just above his head and his father’s big hand had reached down and nearly pulled his arm from its socket.

“Grantaire?”

He can’t hear under water anymore.

“R?  Hey, are you—  Oh.”

He can hardly hear anything at all.

“You can step on it,” he says.  His voice is quiet, rough, only barely slurring.  It sounds better than it would have if he’d spoken half an hour ago but Gavroche had been asleep by then and his own shadow was a terrible conversationalist.  “The paint’s already dry over there.”

Jehan stands stock still, wide-eyed and gaping, and Grantaire stares back at him from the center of the room.  The poet is a riot of clashing patterns and bright colors, an awakening spirit of spring against the dark metal and concrete at the door.  Sometimes R thinks it funny that the best word he can find to describe his friend’s sense of style is “loud.”  Nothing else quite fits in so many ways as that does.  Jehan is loud in sight and sound and heart and mind.  He always is and he always will be, with his wild flowers and pastel hair and words that sound like rivers, and Grantaire loves that, loves everything about Jehan, really, just as he loves everything about Eponine, about Gavroche, about the Roaches and the people of Delta.

Grantaire also loves everything about a fresh bottle of wine.

“R,” Jehan says after a moment, his lips twitching into a faint smile and his hands moving to shape echoes of his words.  “I think you missed your canvas.  Just a bit.”

With a snort, R lifts the bottle to his mouth.

Tentative, enraptured, Jehan toes his shoes from his feet before he enters to take in the entirety of this masterpiece.  The room, once a meeting space, is sized, he imagines, for a small table and a number of chairs.  A plaque on the outside of the door reads “Conference Room #6.”  Grantaire has long since removed any remaining furniture from the premises, however, and now it is no more than an open space.

No more than that and yet so very much more.

A singular mural covers every speck of concrete.  On the floor, Jehan’s feet tread gently across the ruined husk of a world that he recognizes, easily, as Zeta.  The walls are divided into levels, rising, from rotting Epsilon to crumbling Delta to ramshackle Gamma and Beta’s clean streets.  Above them, Alpha’s sprawls and towers shine like beacons, throwing shadows across all who dwell below.  The ceiling, however, is where Jehan lets his linger, where the image spans the sky, from one corner of clear blue to the opposite corner of midnight, and there, in the very center, he stares back into a singular eye.

“This is beautiful, R.”

Grantaire huffs softly, all splattered colors, and trades his win for his palette and brush.

“I’m down to details now.”  He sits himself low before a small, pale, half-drawn figure.  “I’d debated leaving out all the people but—”  His eyes track the ceiling once before he’s focused on his work.

Jehan walks the perimeter, traces landmarks with his fingertips, and ducks down to kiss the top of Grantaire’s head.  “I’ll leave you to it, then.”

The artist hums.

“Oh.”  Chewing at his lip, Jehan taps at R’s shoulder to get the man’s attention.  Once eyes are on him, he raises his hands to be clear.  “Eponine is coming down.  The explosions—  Everything above is a mess.”

R pauses, then nods.  “You’ll all be safer here.”

Jehan simply smiles.  “We’ll have to check on things upside later but for now, yes.”  A pause.  “Do you have an extra power cable?  We should probably have a working phone.”

R nods again, sets his equipment aside, and stands.

Nearer the main room, where Gavroche is still sleeping, a cupboard is revealed to contain little more than masses of jumbled wire.  Jehan blinks at it in quiet confusion for a moment before laughing, the sounded ringing off walls like a chorus of bells.  Grantaire glances over with a faint smirk before he begins untangling.

“I’ll never understand how you do that.”  Jehan leans against the wall to watch.  “It just looks like a bird’s nest to me.  How do you keep all of them straight in your mind?”

Grantaire shakes his head and holds out the requested cable.  “A puzzle.  That’s all a bird’s nest is.”

His friend huffs another quieter laugh as he plugs his cell phone in, then reels the transmission line back across the floor to do the same.  There is an instant of silence, then a buzz to say it’s connected, then a single ring echoes around them and Jehan stops to stare.  “Who would be—”

Before he can even look, the phone is ringing again and he glances toward Grantaire before he answers by speaker.

“I—  Hello?”

_“Prouvaire?  That you?  Where the hell are you?  You’ve got an echo.”_

Jehan blinks at the phone.  “Courfeyrac?”

_“Yeah!  Hey listen.  I’ve got a proposition for you.”_

Grantaire, left ear cocked toward the call, quirks an eyebrow.

Jehan smacks him with the end of a too-long sleeve and scowls, though the expression is borderline playful.  “What sort of proposition are we talking about, exactly?”

There’s a pause before Courfeyrac starts babbling.

_“Well, I was, you know, hoping we could actually meet to talk about it?  Have a little chat.  Maybe grab something to eat.  Plus I’d sort of just like to see you.  Everybody’s a little shaken up.  ’Ferre thinks it’d be a good idea to sort of get everyone together, make sure everybody’s all right.  We’ve got a safe house set up, if you want to come by.  It’s all the way up on Beta but you should see the people in here.  It’s mostly folks from Gamma and Delta.  I think a lot of the people who live in this neighborhood are trying to find places to stay on Alpha just to get away from us.  It’s great.  I can send you directions?”_

R looks amused as Jehan tries to stifle his own smile.  “Sure.  We’re just waiting on Eponine right now.  We can head up when she gets here.”

_“Great!  I’ll see you the—Oh!  Oh, hey.  Your, uh—your ‘we’ includes Grantaire, too, right?”_

The amusement slips into a frown and Jehan watches his friend as he asks, “Why?  Should it?”

Courfeyrac is quiet for a long time before he finally answers.  _“If you think he’ll come up this far, yeah.  Yeah, I think maybe it should.”_

“So,” Courfeyrac draws the word out, quiet and long, once he’s hung up his phone, and glances sidelong toward Combeferre.  He’s not sure what the other is playing at and he doesn’t like that feeling.

Combeferre leans against the wall that surrounds the safe house and its garden, arms crossed over his chest, and watches another upper class family pack their things for Alpha.

“So,” Courf says again, plops his shoulders back against the stone, “why are we dragging Grantaire up here, exactly?  You need Jehan’s coding and Bahorel wants to talk to Eponine but R…”

When he trails off, there is no answer, and he’s tremendously frustrated by the thought that he may not get one until the group arrives, if even then.  Once the family across the way has left, however, Combeferre finally sighs.  “If he comes,” is the first quiet statement.  “He may not.”

It’s true but Courfeyrac still scowls in response.  “He’ll come.  Jehan’ll talk him into it.”

Combeferre hums and leans his head back.  “We need someone to help—  No.  We need someone to _make_ Enjolras plan.”

At that, Courfeyrac just stares.

“I’ll be too busy with the code and you’ll be caught up in organizing the personnel and everyone else has their tasks to complete.”  ’Ferre is quieter, just loud enough for his friend beside him to hear, speaking in the same tones he usually reserves for conspiratorial conversations in the back of the Musain.  “We don’t know what Enjolras is going to come up against.  There could be guards or it could just be a labyrinth.  It may have security systems we’ve never encountered or it could very well just be a straight shot once we get him through the front door.  There’s no way to know.”

“And you think the man who’s been fighting him on everything for years is going to change that?”

Combeferre leans down and looks him straight in the eye, expression tight and stone solid.  “When it comes to Enjolras, Grantaire is the intellectual equivalent to that central chamber.  For each scenario that Enjolras foresees and overcomes, Grantaire will be able to throw him another pitfall, another setback.  Enjolras sees what must be done and aims to do it and believes that, because it is right, this whole thing will work.  What it costs him is of no consequence as long as the plan succeeds and God knows that I respect that but Grantaire—  Grantaire sees futility where Enjolras sees hope.  He sees the darkest nooks and crannies of reality that we skim over with our ideals.  He will fight tooth and nail to remind Enjolras that there is nothing, not one single thing, in this world that can be assured simply because it is just and right and should be.”  Courfeyrac watches, lips pursed and brow furrowed, as his friend removes his glasses and looks away.  “So that is why we need Grantaire to come up here.  We need him because if anyone can prepare Enjolras to get through this alive, R can.”


	6. Invasian

When Jehan arrives, he has Eponine and Gavroche in tow and Courfeyrac greets them with a degree of excitement that even he wasn’t quite expecting before it registers that one of their party is still missing.  The realization leaves him somewhat crestfallen as he releases Jehan from a perhaps too tight embrace.  Gavroche trying to climb him is a decent enough distraction but he still feels a slight twist in his gut as he crouches down to let the boy up on his shoulders.

“Grantaire’s not with you?”

Jehan, slightly pink in the face, glances sideways to catch Eponine’s eye, his bottom lip between his teeth.

Eponine, for her part, simply shrugs.  “He’s down in the conduit.  Says he won’t come up but he should already be patched into the comm line.”

Courfeyrac nods his understanding and tries not to look too relieved.  “Good!  Good.  I’ll just—”

“R thinks you lot are crazy.”  Gavroche suddenly doubles down over Courf’s head, tangled mess of hair and bright, mischievous, little face blocking the others from view.  “He said so.”

Both the boy and his noble steed ignore Jehan’s sound of protest.

“Did he really?”  Courfeyrac raises his eyebrows, drumming his fingertips against the child’s ankles.  “What else does R say he thinks?”

Gavroche just grins, all teeth.  “I want down now.”  Then he’s slid down Courfeyrac’s back and scampering off into the garden, calling back over his shoulder, “R thinks you’re a playboy!”

Jehan has his face in his hands while Eponine massages the bridge of her nose and Courfeyrac smiles after him before waving for the other two to follow.  “Let’s take this talk inside.”

 

Enjolras has hardly been sleeping but that is a fact which surprises absolutely no one.  It has always been the same with every mission and into at least the first week of aftermath and everyone has, by now, simply learned to take it in stride.  They have all learned to adapt to his epiphanies coming at the oddest of hours and their more mundane sorts of conversations taking place around micronaps.  He makes his only real sleep habit a good two hours before a plan launches and, outside of that, he lives on caffeine.

Except they have never launched a plan quite like this.

There are rules set in place.  Combeferre saw to that early on, before there was even a team, when it was just the three of them – Enjolras, Combeferre, and Courfeyrac – running interference against members of Parliament and taking the offensive whenever they could make the chance.  By the calculations, once a plan reached a point at which it could be considered for action, it took one to two weeks of undivided attention to reach fruition and there should be at least a week dedicated to the fallout before anything else could begin.  Once the rest of the group had come on, things had become at once easier and more complicated.  Each new member had brought with them more man power but also a set of skills that allowed Les Amis to consider options that had never before been left open.  Now they had their own lawyers and doctors.  They had engineers and communications specialists and connections from the darkest corners of Delta to the brightest Alpha level spires.  These days, Les Amis are less a mere team and more a specialized unit, a commander and his lieutenants, built to raise Hell as world leaders rise and fall.

This time, however, all rules are out the window.  They are following one mission with another – much bigger, more complex – directly on its heels.  There is no precedent for how they are supposed to handle this situation.

And Enjolras has hardly been sleeping.

“Guess I got the right house.”

Papers fly to the floor as he starts into wakefulness and Enjolras snatches at the blueprint he had been studying before he had, apparently, dozed off.  The voice that woke him is low and graveled and almost gentle but it laughs now as he rubs at his face to be rid of sleep and it’s a struggle to regain composure and simply glare rather than snarl.  Dark and dirty and two days unshaven, Grantaire grins from the study computer’s screen.

“Welcome back, Sleeping Beauty.”  R looks away to fiddle with wires.  “No offense but I got to say—”  He hooks something into his left ear and glances up again.  “Looking like shit today, sir.”

There is a still groggy moment in which Enjolras really just wants to punch him before that urge abruptly ends with two realizations.

“You’re in the Beta conduit.”

“I am.”

“And you’re sober.”

“I like to call it ‘not drunk.’”

They stare at one another, one frowning and one smirking, until the door opens and Combeferre slips in.

Attention shifted, Enjolras looks up at his friend with a sigh.  “This is the thing about Courfeyrac’s contact that I wouldn’t like, isn’t it?  He’s brought Prouvaire on to code for you and what I get out of the bargain is—”  He gestures at the computer with a flick of his wrist and Combeferre adjusts his glasses with a faint smile.

“This portion,” his friend tells him, sitting down, quietly, “was not Courfeyrac’s idea.”

Eyes narrow as Enjolras stares, not understanding.

’Ferre clears his throat and avoids eye-contact in favor of the curious tilt of a paint-streaked artist.  “Courf thought of Jehan when we asked for a Coder, yes, but the thought of bringing Grantaire into the mix was mine.”

R hums as Enjolras scoffs at his second in mild confusion.  “Would you happen to want to explain exactly why?”

It’s quiet for a minute.  At least it feels like a minute.  In reality it is more of a blink.  Grantaire leans forward, adjusts the speaker in his good ear, and settles his features into a more serious expression than Enjolras, in all of their many heated encounters, can ever remember having seen.  So close to the camera, in the dim, flickering light of the conduit, he looks like a ghost in the shadow.

“Your friend over there asked me to run your scenarios.”

When Enjolras simply stares, Combeferre still doesn’t meet his gaze.

“We don’t know what’s waiting inside the Core chamber.  I know we’ve discussed it and I know that you’ve planned but Grantaire will make sure that you’re actually ready to handle it.”

Enjolras feels his jaw clenching and forces it loose.  “And how, exactly, does he intend to do that?”

“By giving you the chamber schematic.”

Both Amis lose their trains of thought and find themselves staring, off-guard and wide-eyed at the glowing computer.

Grantaire simply stares back until his face vanishes and the screen fills with a blue page of white lines.

“That—”  It’s Combeferre who collects himself first and thus it’s Combeferre who splutters.  “That was not—  How do you have that?  Bossuet and Feuilly and—  We’ve been trying to get into those files for years!  How could you possibly—”

Grantaire drops the page, laughing.  “I didn’t break their database, if that’s what you’re thinking.  That’s Jehan’s niche, not mine.  I am solely hands-on and this, my friends, is sloppy hardcopy.”

That fact does nothing to settle their minds.

When Enjolras finally speaks, it’s quiet and steady, and he is staring directly into R’s unflinching eye.  “Where did you get a hardcopy of a blueprint we couldn’t even access electronically?”

Serious again, the artist blinks once.  “It’s the original design.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

Grantaire rubs at his stubble a moment but makes no attempt to avert his gaze when he eventually adds, “It’s _my_ design.”

And that’s when everything goes dark.

 

“The fuck just—”

“Eponine?  Courfeyrac?”

“Jehan, I’m over here.  Just follow my voice or some—  Ow!”

“Sorry, Courf.”

“Feuilly?”

“Yeah.  I’m just trying to get—  Oh shit.”

“What?”

“There’s supposed to be a window here.”

“Wha—  Excuse me?”

“The window!  Goddamnit, I was going to open the window but it’s not there!”

“What do you mean, the windows not there?”

“What Poland’s trying to say is somebody tripped the security same time they tripped the lights.  We’re in a big, steel box, ladies and gentlemen.”  Bahorel looks deathly serious as he pulls out his phone to use as a light.  “We’re in a big, steel jail box with a bunch of civilians downstairs.”

 

They blow the door in like it’s nothing.  A contorted slab of steel shoots through the front atrium and it doesn’t cross Javert’s mind to so much as care who’s been struck.  His officers troop in around him to the sound of people screaming and he watches their progress with pride, cold and unyielding.  He tears bad roots out of Gamma, herds the rats up from Delta.  Some fight and some go quietly and he will take either one.

 

A shot goes off on the floor below them and the screaming is silence for a moment before it redoubles.  Bahorel, for a moment transfixed by the terror, drops his phone as he launches himself out the door.  There’s only a pause before Feuilly snatches the machine up and shoves it in his pocket as he follows.

“Joly?  Joly _come back_.”  Bossuet grasps at air too late as the doctor, previously sat beside him, gives chase to their friends.  In an instant, he’s up and stumbling with Musichetta close beside.  “We can’t let him—”

’Chetta shushes.  “Come on.”

The rest just stare out after.

“This can’t be happening,” Marius finally mutters, voice cracking.  “Not here.  Not _here_.  This can’t happen here.”

Then Eponine is choking in the corner.  “Where’s Gavroche?”

Courfeyrac curses as she and Jehan are the next through the door.

 

It’s a hell of a sight, cast in the glare of the search light, and Grantaire squints against it as he watches the fray.  A Precinct raid on a legally declared safe house is something no one was expecting.  Abuse of authority, this is brutality at its finest.

He finds the shadows they’ve left like any creature of the dark.

The first thing he finds is a little boy, waving.  There are words but all he hears is the battles beyond.  “Hey, Gav.”  Grantaire pulls the boy down out of a cupboard, a cupboard which he realizes, quite suddenly, is just one of the many that currently hide children.  It makes his heart stop for an instant.

That’s when Gavroche starts scrambling.

Three officers close in on the lone adult in the room and R lets them crowd him until they’re too close.  New cops, he figures, fresh out of academy.  They don’t know any better and that’s just fine by him.  No one ever teaches them that proximity affects weapons.  It’s easy to use it to his advantage when that leaves them confused.

“Gavroche!”  He nails one soldier, flat palm to the nose, and carries the man’s head into the next.  Their feet as they fall tangle with those of the third.  “Down and out!”

Then they’re trampled by a small stampede of scared children.

He’s out of the kitchen without even thinking, into the tumbling mass of bodies.  Officers swing without aim, without striking.  People run past and it’s all a whir of dull noise.  Somewhere in a hallway, he ducks straight into Feuilly, who nearly hits him before eyes register and lips move in surprise.  Together, they throw their shoulders into the back of a rather large man in riot gear who has almost got Bahorel cornered.

Grantaire pulls Feuilly in closer, hisses into his ear.  “Get who you can to the conduit.  Gavroche will show you.”

Through the throng again, he flings himself up the stairs.

He catches Jehan and Eponine through a break in the shadows.  They drag Courfeyrac and Marius and a girl he assumes is Cosette.  His feet carry him down hallways, over the wounded, through the warpath.  His hand catches Musichetta by the elbow.  In return for his instructions, she points his way before she disappears.

The door is barred.

“Jesus Christ, you have got to be kidding me.”

Heel to the lock and the frame cracks with round two.

“Out!”  The door swings open on the third blow and Combeferre stumbles back in surprise.  “Get out!”  Grantaire doesn’t care what either of them are saying.  “Today is _not_ the day we die.”

He ducks another would-be attacker and lets a suddenly much closer Enjolras take care of the rest.  Back down the stairs is going to be tricky.  Lips are moving but he can’t catch their sound.  Instead, he grabs the man by the wrist and just pulls him.  That part turns out much easier than expected, even if the path they must follow does not.  The crowd below is being rounded, like cattle.  There is no way out of this without showing face.

Someone shoves him.  His heel misses the third step.  A hand catches his elbow so he stumbles but does not fall.

“Can you get him out of this?”

R jerks, turns his head, comes eye to eye with a solemn Combeferre and contemplates his options for a beat before slowly nodding.

“Then do it.”

They stare at one another a moment longer before Combeferre breaks into a run.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Maybe some day I'll give Javert some actual characterization in this. Today is not that day.
> 
> Also, I will casually mention here for those who didn't actually happen to find me via tumblr that I am keeponshouting over there as well. Feel free to come say hi or whatever.


	7. Everything is Automatic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lot of this chapter was written while I was sick and groggy from fevered sleep so, uh, enjoy that fact, I suppose.

They have been together forever, it seems, almost constant companions since they were born.  They have grown together, they have lived together, they have loved together, and they have weathered more than their fair share of storms.  They were two parts of one whole long before they started finding other pieces and to separate them now is like severing a limb.

Shock strikes with rough hands and desperate strength before his mind can even wrap around it.

Combeferre throws the crowd back into a panic, hurls them into action against their startled guards.  Enjolras doesn’t have time to see what happens.  Someone swings, he knows.  Bodies hide the sight of who goes down.

Then he’s being dragged backward, a hand at his mouth and an arm at his waist, and he registers his own muffled screaming.  _So this_ , he thinks, distantly, _is what terror feels like_.  The thought throws him back into silence.

How they get below, he isn’t certain.  He vaguely recalls being chased by someone.  Shots are fired, punches thrown.  Blood is everywhere but it was all there before this.  They stumble over bodies and then they’re gone.  By the end, he’s sat in darkness and he’s shaking.

“We have to keep moving.”

Face in his hands, his thoughts feel sluggish.  When he opens his eyes, he can barely see.  After the search lights, the dim fluorescence of the conduit is near cave darkness and he squints to focus on the man sat some few feet away.

“You’re bleeding.”

Grantaire glances back at him but doesn’t say a word.  He is busy shredding his scarf into bandages.

Enjolras watches, bleary, as the man tears with one hand and his teeth.  It’s a frustrating process, even from the outside.  At some point, he realizes, he snatches the whole mess away.

“Let me do that.  You’re just making it worse.”

R quirks a brow and yet remains quiet.

It takes some time to wrap his wounds properly, with dirty fabric and only a small bit of vodka at the bottom of Grantaire’s pocket flask, but the task helps to bring Enjolras back to himself.  Grantaire has taken a shot to his left shoulder.  Bullets grazed his left temple and right thigh.  For a moment, it leaves Enjolras wondering how he has personally come out of this relatively unscathed.  Then memories float in and out of fog – R stepping in front of a punch (bruising of the ribs), shouldering him through a doorway (bullet lodged in scapula), tackling someone (tearing of the shoulder wound and bruising of the jaw and hip) – and he finds himself suddenly glad for the low lighting when he feels himself go pale.

“Why are you doing this?”

Grantaire doesn’t look up.  He’s too busy trying to stand.  “Doing what?”

_Saving me._   Enjolras grabs the man’s good arm and helps him to his feet.  “Helping us.”

The answer starts with a grunt as R looks around them, scoops up a stray cable, and starts moving into the shadows at such a quick limp that Enjolras nearly stumbles over darkness in his hurry to find pace.

“I’m helping you for a lot of reasons,” the answer finally comes once they’re walking more normally, side-by-side.  “Combeferre asked me to, for one, and as much as I like some of your boys, sometimes he makes more goddamned sense than the rest of you lot put together.”

“Combeferre isn’t my ‘ _boy_ ’.  None of them are _boys_.”

“Yeah, well, Bahorel’s the only one’s older than me and he’s still kind of like that big kid everybody wants in their sandbox, plus most of them only never argue with orders ’cause you’re a fucking monster when you’re angry, so I’m pretty sure I’m gonna keep calling them children.”

Enjolras does his best to ignore the comment on his own behavior.  “Says the man who spends his time with street urchins.”

R still doesn’t look at him but he snorts.  “Yeah.  What’s up with that guy anyway?  It’s like he’s an actual Under-dweller or something instead of just some uppity spire brat who’s got his fucking pants in a twist.”

When Enjolras swings, it’s without any thought to the splotch of angry midnight colors already blooming along the line of Grantaire’s jaw.  In fact, it’s without any thought at all.  It’s an uncontrolled and overly emotional reaction and he hates himself for giving into it in an instant.

R lies back into the curve of the conduit wall again, choking on a mixture of laughter and pain.  “Jesus shit.  I hit a sore spot there or what?”

The way he smirks makes that fire begin to rise in the pit of Enjolras’s stomach again.  The exhaustion that has now become visible in every line of his face puts it out.  “I’m sorry.  That was—”

“One hell of a left hook.”

They pause a moment, eyes locked, and Enjolras finds a very different feeling in that half-lidded look before he pulls R to his feet again.

“So why else?”  The words are quieter than he’d like, as they round a corner into a maze and he finds himself having to fall a half-step behind to follow.

Grantaire’s steps are sure and he only glances back to be certain that he hasn’t lost his shadow (or possibly to check that he hasn’t gained a new one).  “Well, it doesn’t hurt you any that my friends are kind of into this whole thing, to varying degrees.  Jehan thinks you’re right most of the time but he won’t say anything because he thinks it might upset me.  Eponine’s got the hots for Marius, which is maybe the most fucking doomed thing I’ve ever seen aside from me, but you’ve sort of half got the bug in her ear at this point, too, and Gav pretty much aspires to your level of deluded grandeur so I guess I’ve been harboring a mini-revolutionary under my roof for the past couple years now.  Who knew?”  He moves sideways into a tunnel Enjolras never would have even seen otherwise and their trek begins to follow a distinctly downhill path.  “Of course, after today, I’ve got a feeling I may be harboring a few more revolutionaries than that.  Wanted ones, even.  You kids sure know how to party.”

Enjolras isn’t even sure where to begin with all of that but finds himself asking, “And there’s nothing in this for you?”

Ahead of him, he once more hears the echo of that derisive snort, though he’s not entirely certain if the derision is actually there or simply imagined due to former familiarity with the sound.  “Doesn’t really hurt you any that you’re pretty, either.”

He scowls.  “Seriously, Grantaire.”

R shrugs, winces, holds his still-oozing shoulder with his good hand.  “I’m pretty serious when I say you may want to pull that hair of yours back before we take this next step.”

Enjolras nearly runs right into him before even realizing that they’re stopping.  Then he sees why and feels his face drain of color once again.  “We’re going down that.”  It’s a statement, not a question.

Grantaire starts trying to strip one layer of his shirts off as he nods.

“How are you going to—damnit, let me help with—”  The clothing removal is far less frustrating with two people, even if it’s no less awkward.  Enjolras shoves the dirty mess of a shirt into Grantaire’s hands and simply returns to staring down the large pipe in front of him.  A mass of smaller pipes and cables and wires hangs directly down its center and he realizes then that they must have been taking mostly the work tunnels.  Grantaire has memorized them and, right now, is focused entirely upon wrapping his hands.

“You’ll want to do the same, sweetheart,” the man informs him without even looking to see that his captive audience is staring.

“Grantaire, how exactly do you intend to do this?”

Now R finally looks up.  “That cable.”  He points to a mass of them and Enjolras can barely tell one apart from any other.  They’re all different colors and widths but he knows very little about them.  That’s always been someone else’s job.  His guide sighs at his blank expression and sticks his good hand in to make their specific escape route more visible.  In the light, it’s an odd shade of green.

“There’s another one just like it on the other side.  They’re the only cables that run directly from Alpha to Zeta for at least two miles.  It’ll be strong enough to hold you and there are minimal break points but the pipeline gets pretty thin when you’re going down levels, so watch out.  It’s kind of a tight squeeze and that silver line to your right?  Yeah, you don’t want to touch that.  I mean, unless your new plan is to die of electrocution in the dark heart of the conduits instead of saving the world or whatever.”  Enjolras glares but R just ignores it.  “If you have to touch it with anything for any reason, make that thing the bottom of your boot.  The rubber might be thick enough to keep the current from jumping so that’s your best bet.  For the most part, though, keep your back to my back and your feet on the wall.”

Enjolras absorbs all of this, takes a deep breath, and strips off his jacket to turn his t-shirt into wrapping.  “And with your shoulder the way it is?”

Grantaire huffs a laugh.  “Let’s just hope that Joly made it down safely because I’m sure as hell gonna need a doctor when we get there.”

Just as he ignored the glare, now he ignores the frown.

“We’ll stop under Delta and walk the rest.”

As he grips the proffered cable and watches Grantaire walk around to the other side, Enjolras starts and stops his next question twice before finally asking, “How long is this climb, exactly?”

R glances through the dangling bundles.  “I can’t do exact numbers but it’s a little less than a mile.”

They stare at one another for a moment before the darker man grins.

“Whenever you’re ready, sunshine.”

 

When Grantaire said “tight squeeze,” he apparently meant that it would barely be wide enough to safely climb down the pipes together.  The entire way down, Enjolras keeps an eye on the cable he’s not meant to touch, which runs down the wall not nearly far enough from where his one foot keeps landing and it surprises him each time that his shoulders bump against R’s back.  They almost stop for a short rest in the conduit under Gamma but Enjolras thinks better of it when he realizes that his arms are too tense and already shaking.  By the time they reach their destination, he can hardly convince his fingers to uncurl.

Given his own aching shoulders and the straining muscles down his spine, he isn’t at all sure how Grantaire even managed it.  They hadn’t looked at one another the entire way down, conversing back-to-back mostly when Enjolras needed to be warned of something he had no reason to notice for himself, and the other man’s voice had sounded casual enough, if weary.  Settled down to rest now, however, what Enjolras does have the sense and energy to notice leaves him worried.  Grantaire rests with knees to his forehead and clutches at his shoulder with fingers that tremble from pain.

“How much further?”

R doesn’t look up as he answers the question and his voice is quiet, muffled, breath uneven.  “Not far, if you’re willing to take some sewage pipes.”

As disgusting as the thought is, Enjolras grunts his concession.  At this point, whatever gets them wherever they’re going as quickly as possible will do.  Though, as he watches his companion, his brow furrows.

“How likely are the contents of those pipes to get into your wounds?”

Grantaire finally glances over his knees and Enjolras is fairly certain that he’s sweating more profusely than he should be, even after that horrid climb down.  “It’s a quick slide through sewage pipes or another hour hike in the conduit before we make land.”  With a grunt, R drags himself back up to his feet, this time dodging any attempt at assistance.  “I’ll gladly deal with a little chance of infection if it gets me home faster.”

Enjolras frowns, though the expression is not as harsh as it might usually be, tempered as it is by the combined sense of mental and physical exhaustion.  “You said we were stopping below Delta, didn’t you?”

“I did.”

“Then why are we—”  When his thoughts catch up with him, Enjolras can’t help but let the sudden shock of realization cross his face.  “You don’t live on Delta.”

“I don’t.”

“But where—”

Grantaire scowls but he’s far too tired to give the expression any strength.  “You’ll see soon enough.  Now come on.”

When R stumbles, Enjolras sighs and slips himself under the good arm as support, refusing to let himself be pushed aside again.  “What’s the quickest route, then?”

There’s a huff of resignation.  “We need to take the first tunnel to the right.”


	8. Apparitions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning up front that this chapter may be rather depressing. I say "may" because not everyone has the same standards but it still made me sadface while writing some of it.

The sewage pipe is almost entirely empty.  It’s sunk down where it crosses the work tunnel, the top cut off to allow access, and there’s only about half an inch of liquid and sludge trickling underfoot.  The entire pipe is slick with algae, however, the greens and browns of it creeping up onto the walkway, and the air is thick with a smell worse than anything Enjolras can ever remember.  He nearly gags when it first hits his nose and Grantaire stops him for a moment, lips twitching into a faint smirk under the lines of pain and tangle of sweat-drenched hair.

“Here.”  He lets his arm drop from its place over Enjolras’s shoulders and takes a hold of the man’s hand instead.

Enjolras simply stares at him in surprise for a moment before he actually registers what R is doing and finds himself glad for the fact that the other is so distracted.  Grantaire just awkwardly tugs the knot out of one of the hand wrappings and shakes the fabric out to its full length.  He glances up once, tired and considering, before handing the scrap of shirt back to Enjolras.

“Wrap that over your nose and mouth.  It won’t help a whole lot with the smell but it’ll be better than nothing and you won’t have to worry about anything getting in.”

That being said, R sets to removing one of his own wraps to do the same for himself.  It hardly takes any time at all for Enjolras to don his own makeshift mask and, after a beat too long of watching the mounting frustration on his companion’s face, he grasps at those dark, shaking hands to make them stop.  Grantaire scowls but doesn’t look him in the eye so Enjolras isn’t sure if the expression is directed more at his interruption or at how difficult it seems to have become for R to continue on as he would when uninjured.  Honestly, it doesn’t really matter.

Enjolras pulls the knot apart, unwinds the thing, and ties the fabric behind Grantaire’s head.

After a moment’s hesitation, Enjolras is the first to climb down, carefully placing his feet on either side of the small stream, where grooves have been notched in for workmen to make repairs without slipping.  He helps Grantaire make the short descent after, making no comment on the other’s grumbling, and thinks it’s probably for the best that his mask hides the vague, upward curve that’s snuck into the line of his lips.  R only glances back once before he ducks into a crouch, carefully places both feet on top of the center line of refuse, and tracks the side of the tunnel with the fingertips of his good hand as gravity begins to pull him into the darkness below.  Enjolras watches until he’s almost disappeared before sighing in resignation.

How hard can this possibly be?

The answer, of course, is “much harder than it looks” and he doesn’t actually get terribly far before his feet go out from under him.  It’s a much quicker trip on his rear, having far less control over his momentum as he slips through the shadows at a speed that at least manages to distract him from exactly where he’s sitting.  That is, until he shoots out and lands, full-body splash, in the tremendously unhygienic shallows of a lake.  Everything about the entire situation makes him at once annoyed and relieved to see Grantaire standing at the base of the tunnel with a hidden grin that reaches up to his eyes.

“Welcome to Epsilon.”

Enjolras clambers up to his feet, practically growling.  “Don’t make me hit you again.”

Grantaire snickers at that, leaning his good shoulder against the side of the tunnel and pulling his mask down to hang around his neck.  “Hate to break it to you, sweetheart, but your threats aren’t all that effective when you’re dripping pond scum.”

“Hmph.”  To be fair, though, when he catches his reflection on the water’s settling surface, Enjolras has to admit that R’s right.  He pulls his own mask off as well.  “How long before I can shower?”

R’s eyebrows rise, disappearing into the hair that’s still plastered to his forehead.  “Who says I’ve even got a shower?  We’re pretty far down, you know.”

Enjolras keeps his expression schooled and flat.  “Grantaire…”

All he gets for his cool glaring is another look at that grin as R pushes off of his support and half trots, half stumbles over to meet him.  “Twenty minutes.  Thirty tops.”  So they continue on their way.

 

The first time he sees one, he thinks it’s just his imagination.  Not that Enjolras has ever been a terribly imaginative person but he has seen enough horrors in the past, between missions gone wrong and digging through Parliamentary information, that he’s well aware of the many more gruesome possibilities that are out there.  Still, the odd stories that he’s caught wind of now and again amongst the beggars and alley rats of Delta always seemed like they were meant simply to scare, not to be real.  So by his third glimpse of something pale and sickly ducking out of his line of sight, it’s needless to say that his skin is beginning to crawl.

They had barely started walking before he’d noticed that there was much less light on Epsilon than what could even be boasted of the conduit system.  Near the exit from the sewage pipe had been bright enough but what lay beyond quickly drifted into night.  He had always thought that Delta was far too dark a place for people to live but this?  This was appalling, even terrifying, like a catacomb, a man-made cave, settled deep below the waking world.  The lamps were dim and algae-ridden, those that had not gone out altogether still sputtering in and out of life in fits and starts and casting everything into a flickering whirl of gloom.  Half of the time he couldn’t even see where he was going and his guide had noticed as much without comment.  When the way grew too dim, he felt Grantaire’s hand at his elbow, tugging, stopping, keeping him on their path without speaking.  While grateful, he found the silence almost as unsettling as the dark.

His fourth sighting was so clear, he suddenly found himself unable to move.

“Enjolras?”

Eyes wide, looking more frightened, he is certain, than he has since he was a child and most definitely more so than he would prefer to appear before his current sole witness, Enjolras finds himself unable to respond, caught in the flickering crosshairs of a pale and curious stare.  The creature is small, juvenile in shape and stature, no larger than a five year old boy.  Its hair is long and muddy, skin a shade lighter than the ruins that frame its shoulders.  Its small fingers and toes curl over the edge of the crumbling window sill atop which it sits, crouching, nails framed with black dirt and only a pair of ragged shorts covering it from waist to knee.  That is what makes him realize—

“It’s a child.”

Grantaire stands quiet beside him for a long stretch before sighing.  “It is, yes.  So’s the one peeking ’round the corner there and the two off to your left a bit.  Probably more hiding all along this street, if I know them.”

Enjolras feels his face soften into an expression that matches his sudden horrified confusion.  “Which you do, I’m guessing.”

R hums an affirmative.  “Which I do.”

The boy in the window hops down and scampers over to them.  Viewed like stop-motion in the flickering lamplight, what Enjolras sees of the movement sends a shiver down his spine.  It doesn’t bother the child, however, nor does it seem to bother Grantaire, as the man lets the boy cling to his hip, all skittering spider, and the smile that they share turns the fearful chill into a very sudden flame of the heart.

“These,” Grantaire says, quietly but contentedly, “are my Roaches.”  The tone of affection placed on the word lends a tilt to the little one’s head.  “They’re not all children but kids are curious where adults are wary.  I don’t usually bring strangers with me when I come this way.”

Enjolras feels as if his mouth has gone dry when he opens it, closes it, tries once again.  “Why did you bring me this way, then?”  Certainly not to frighten them.  To frighten _him_ maybe.

“As I told you before,” R says as he shrugs his good shoulder and turns to Enjolras with that strange, gentle smile still in place, “it was the quickest way from where we were to where we’re going.”  Then his face falls and he looks so tired again while adding, “And maybe it’s just something I thought you should see.”

Hands scrubbing his face, Enjolras breathes in, deeply, his fear slowly transforming into something he can better understand.  These are people here, living under the name given to the monsters of Up-Dweller legend.  These are people, living and breathing and somehow surviving here in the dark.  When he was a child, his nanny used to use those monsters to scare him.  Adults used their real fear, such unknown, to make their children behave.  In front of him now, Grantaire watches his thoughts turning behind his eyes, like the first bright rays of a new day dawning and Enjolras lets his hands drop to his sides as his own exhaustion comes stealing in.

“This,” Grantaire says, his voice low and heavy, “is another reason why I’m helping you.  I don’t care about Parliament getting their comeuppance for what they did to me, as you’ve so often told me I should, no.  What I’d love to see, though, is Parliament paying for what they’ve done to these.”

 

The children follow them until they reach the sinkhole, where the structure of the Epsilon conduit has collapsed into Zeta below.  Enjolras stares across the vast opening, then down at the slope of jagged concrete and splintered steel, before looking back at the straggling little pack and their parents and neighbors peering out of windows and around walls some ways beyond.  He no longer feels fear at the sight of it but their rapt attention still gives him a chill.  Crouched a few feet away, Grantaire’s hands and arms fly through a series of motions, some of which Enjolras vaguely recognizes from watching Eponine and Jehan.  Then Enjolras blinks and R has moved to stand by his side.

“Come on.”  The command is quiet and gentle and Grantaire moves away with it, leading him through a passage that must have once been a door.

On the other side of it is the top of a path marked in stripes of luminescence, like a winding stair carved into the wreckage, guiding them— no, guiding Grantaire safely home.  Enjolras glances back once, watches white faces disappearing, then carefully takes his first step down.  It is obvious, upon his use of it, that the path is less carved in most places than simply worn by passage and he tries not to watch the man in front of him more than he manages to watch his own feet.  That task is only made more difficult by the knowledge that he has looked up more than once to find Grantaire watching him.

They reach the rooftop of an old building not too far into their descent and R leads him over the edge of it and in through a window.  The space they enter, he can see from the pealing walls and rotten furnishings, was once a child’s bedroom.  Then they enter the rest of the apartment, exit into the hallway, take the door at the end, and follow a concrete stair down.  Faded and falling, there are signs on many of the walls to proclaim their path a fire exit, instructing them to continue heading deeper.

“Grantaire.”

R stops at the next landing and watches him, waiting.  Once they’re side by side again, though, Enjolras finds himself simply frowning.  Now he’s got the man’s attention, he’s misplaced his many questions and he can’t seem to form his thoughts into new ones anymore.  The sensation of being lost for words is not unfamiliar but is still only passingly known at the most.  They stare at one another and Enjolras suddenly wants to feel angry.  With Grantaire, anger has always been his default emotional response.  Yet he can’t – after everything the man has led him through today, he can’t muster that fire – and they continue after a moment, matching strides.


	9. Haven't Slept In Years

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a bit shorter than intended and got minimal editing but I was determined to get it done and posted before going to bed tonight. So yeah. Enjoy some minor history lessons and I promise the next chapter will be more interesting. Uh, also, it's been a long time since I took a non-art-related anatomy class so please ignore my explanation of R's injury if it doesn't make any sense.

Jehan meets them.  In fact, stood watch at the top of a crest that was once a building, he catches sight of them before they even finish blinking at the fresh lamp light the city limits afford.  In no time, he takes off running and doesn’t realize until too late that R is injured.  His arms are already around broad, sweaty shoulders with words that, in exhaustion, sound foreign and he leaps back at the small hiss of pain.  He looks for all the world like an overgrown child, his eyes wide and face dirty and clothes noticeably torn.  There are splatters of blood on his floral jacket and streaks of it clash in his lavender hair and he fidgets with the fraying braid that dangles over one shoulder.  Then, before a word can be said against it, he’s hugging Enjolras as well.

“Oh.  Oh lord, we were getting worried.”  When he pulls back, his hands still cling to Enjolras’s shoulders and his bottom lip pulls in between his teeth.  “I told them you’d be safe but—”  He only seems to let go so his hands can start flying as he begins speaking to Grantaire without saying a word.

R grunts in answer to something and tries to straighten the slump in his stance but he only succeeds in throwing himself off balance.  Enjolras catches him and drags the man’s arm back over his shoulders while Jehan suddenly looks much more worried.  Grantaire doesn’t look at either of them as he scowls.

“I’m fine.”  His voice is a low growl of mingled exhaustion and frustration.  “Just get me home.”

It’s not a long way from there – just over the ridge, through the rusted remains of high-security fence lines, past the steel slab of a door.  The above ground portion of the structure they enter is little more than a concrete box built into the side of a low mountain and the inside walls are lined with open shelves, a broken gun locker shoved into one corner, a scuffed stair leading down from the center of the space.  On the dead and blown-out land around them, there are other buildings visible but those would just be field offices, open training spaces, housing for vehicles.  Enjolras recognizes the design from his childhood history books.  It’s the same as all of the military bases of the Last Great War, he knows, though he’s never seen one in person before.  His mind can still reel off some of the “exciting” facts that the books, aimed at hooking children who might someday enter the military of the future, had offered him.  For instance, there were four standard layouts, all following the same basic design, and which one was to be used depended upon the terrain in which the base was to be installed.  This, being built under a mountain, should consist of four sprawling levels.  At the base of the entrance stair would be a security point leading into an atrium.  Once in the atrium, civilians would be ushered down a second stair while personnel would move forward and through the next security point.  Covering two square miles, the lower two level were meant to be mostly self-sustaining while safely housing approximately forty thousand people.  The upper entrance level and one above, with an extra mile square tacked on somewhere, was designed to contain everything that any self-respecting military base should and was also capable of housing as many soldiers as there were civilians below.

Once, in the thick of war, an enemy mole had bombed the atrium of a two-level plains base.  The explosive in question had been a purely incendiary model, built for enclosed spaces, eating oxygen and leaving all else for ash.  The discharge, uncontrolled, had swept through the central landing and funneled into the level below before causing a large portion of the field above to collapse.  Losses had ultimately tallied one enemy, approximately ten thousand friendly soldiers, and 36,892 civilian lives.

The enemy forces had taken victory two months later and so the first generation of New Parliamentary Rule had been born.

When they enter the atrium now, there is a crowd of people, and Enjolras finds a rambling Courfeyrac at his elbow almost immediately.  “Thank God!  Where have you been?  We got all these people out and we were just figuring we’d leave anybody healthy back on Delta but it turns out the Precinct is raiding all of the safe houses – every fucking one – and people were hiding all over the fucking conduit system and shit and Jehan said he knew where we’d have enough room and really be safe so we just started picking people up as we went and fuck!  Do you have any idea how hard it is to herd thousands of people through the dark without losing anybody or getting caught or something?  It is not fucking easy, let me tell you.  I don’t know how you do this whole fearless leader gig without losing your shit because, I swear, I hope I never have to fill your shoes ever fucking again.”  There’s a pause for one deep breath that turns into a beat and a blink and then, much quieter and voice cracking, “Where’s ’Ferre?”

The room they stand in is far from silent, the rest of Les Amis following Eponine’s lead in organizing their crowd of restless and often terrified civilians, but all of it focuses into a singular hum in his ears as Enjolras meets Courfeyrac’s wide-eyed stare.  His own eyes, he knows, do not express nearly enough of the emotions that he would prefer.  There is no passion, no power, no confidence.  He is too tired and he has been through too much and he has closed his fire back into the furnace of his heart to let it regain its strength before it burns itself down to coals.  Breathing deeply, he shifts under Grantaire’s weight, tightens his arm around the other man’s waist without thinking and is surprised when the arm slung over his shoulders, wrist held in his hand, squeezes ever so slightly in return.

“He was taken in the raid,” he finally says, hearing his own voice like a distant wind, low and quiet and haunted.  “He caused a distraction to let us escape.”

As Enjolras and Combeferre were two pieces of one whole long before they had started finding others, Courfeyrac had completed their holy trinity.

“So hey.”

Courfeyrac, gone pale as a ghost, and Enjolras, simply staring, both start at the gruff voice that interrupts them.  It sounds slightly slurred and mumbling and even Jehan, quietly fidgeting, brings his hands up to his mouth to muffle a squeak of surprise.  Grantaire just glances around at them through his drooping eyelashes and tangled hair with a grin that’s more a grimace struggling to keep its place.

“Much as I hate to play the heartless bastard here,” he mutters, “I could really use a doctor right about now.”

Courfeyrac works his jaw like a fish out of water for a moment before snapping his mouth shut and nodding, expression suddenly turned to steel.  “Right.  Eponine’s got Joly set up just inside.”

Enjolras nods and all but carries Grantaire the rest of the way.

Past the security point is the parade ground.  It is the largest, most open space in the entire structure, once rotating in use from practice field to auditorium to mess hall and back again.  Now, however, it has become a makeshift clinic.  Chairs and tables unused since long before any of those present were even born have been pulled out of storage to accommodate those in need of medical attention and Joly and Musichetta have roped anyone and everyone with any degree of medical knowledge into helping them care for the sick and the wounded.  Grantaire insists on being taken to the far side of the room, where his moth-eaten living room furniture has been shoved up against the wall that separates the parade from the kitchens, and Enjolras carefully deposits his ever-growing burden on the sofa before stretching the kinks out of his own back.  They don’t have to wait long before being met by Joly.  He appears, scowling around a burnt out cigarette, lip split and one eye resting above a much darker circle than the other.

“I’m not even going to ask after the mess.”

Dirty bandages are removed, followed by layers of clothing, and Enjolras sits down to watch the proceedings with a tired frown.  Grantaire looks only half-conscious of the situation anymore, shivering when he’s left bare-chested but otherwise seemingly unaware.  That is until Joly sets to removing the bullet from where it’s lodged itself into bone.

“Jesus fuck, man, that hurts!”

“Of course it does.”  The doctor continues his work, all business, and removes a particularly nasty looking shard of bone as well.  “If taking a bullet doesn’t hurt, you’re either a berserker or you’ve got much bigger things to worry about.  Like, say, death.”

Grantaire huffs a breath through gritted teeth and Enjolras leans forward, ducking his head to hide the ghost of a smile.

His left scapula is partially shattered where it meets the acromion and the coracoid process.  “In short,” Joly says, twenty minutes later, as Musichetta helps him with strapping Grantaire’s arm and chest together, “your ball and socket is ostensibly just a ball, no socket, and your clavicle is sort of just floating at one end.  I’d usually suggest a replacement but we’re not exactly equipped to provide that here.”

R drags his hand over his face with a sigh.  “Great.”

Joly relights what’s left of his cigarette.  “On the bright side, the rest of your injuries are pretty minor.  Everything’s going to be sore for a while but that’s it.  Don’t over exert yourself and you’ll be fine.”

That doesn’t seem to make Grantaire feel any better.

Once Joly has gone back to his other patients, Jehan makes the tremendously welcome suggestions of sleep and Enjolras helps the invalid back to his feet.  For once there is no argument.  R just slumps into the support with a quiet groan that somehow almost sounds grateful and Jehan leads the way down a wide corridor.  It isn’t a long walk, which is just as well.  Grantaire keeps growing heavier by the moment and Enjolras can feel the last dregs of his own energy draining away.

“Here.”  Jehan is quiet as he pushes a door open to reveal four sets of bunk beds and a row of lockers along a back wall.  “It’s not your room but it’ll do for now, right?”

R grunts his assent and lets himself be ushered into one of the beds.

That taken care of and Jehan tucking Grantaire in to the tune of gentle comforts, Enjolras collapses onto the mattress opposite with a quiet groan.  He leans back and closes his eyes, rubs his hands over his face and considers the fact that he really needs a shower.  His clothes have dried stiff and still smell vaguely of refuse.  When he opens his eyes again, however, he’s lying on his side, his shoes off and jacket gone, shoulders covered with a blanket, and all he hears is Grantaire softly snoring in the dark.


	10. Fearless

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little bit longer than most of my chapters but it also took me a little bit longer than it should have to write so I guess that evens out. Whatever the case, enjoy.

When Enjolras wakes, the other bed is empty, and he finds himself staring at it for some time before he’s fully aware of his surroundings.  Everything aches, though he’s in no way surprised by that.  It takes more effort than it should just to stand and walking is, at first, a fresh exercise in masochism as well.  He has never thought himself particularly out of shape, given the series of personalized work-out regimen he had very purposefully had Bahorel build for each of them the moment it had become obvious that their goals were going to involve a great deal of physical activity in order to be achieved, but yesterday had taken him above and beyond anything for which he had ever truly thought to prepare.

Upon entering the parade, he finds that things have changed there.  The makeshift clinic has been rearranged and shifted closer to the kitchen and he finds himself greeted by a lopsided smile from Marius, who looks tired and generally disheveled but still far better than Courfeyrac, who’s slumped over the table and faintly snoring beside him.  There are plates, one in front of the conscious man and one set across the table from him, both containing decent portions of bacon, toast, and scrambled egg.  Enjolras has just placed his hands on the back of a chair when Cosette appears, standing on tip-toe to kiss his cheek, before handing a cup of coffee over to Marius’s eager hands.

“Good morning.”  She’s like a bird, bright and cheerful even under the layers of dirt and splatters of blood.  There’s a nasty gash on her cheek held closed by a series of small bandages and yet she’s smiling as if it were just another lovely day.  “’Chetta and I’ve been helping Jehan put together some breakfast.  There’s not much here but it should be enough to keep up stamina.”  She pushes her own plate over in front of the chair behind which Enjolras is standing and, before he can protest, simply adds, “Water or coffee?  ’Chetta’s made it, as usual.  It’s the one thing we’ve found in abundance here.  Well, aside from Grantaire’s rather impressive stash of pre-Parliamentary wines.”

Enjolras can’t help a faint chuckle as he eases into his seat, as essentially directed, and bites back a grimace at the pain it causes.  “Coffee would be most appreciated.  Thank you.”

The food isn’t bad.  In fact, it’s better than most of what he’s eaten over the past few weeks, months, maybe years, though he’s debating over whether or not he wants to know where someone living on Zeta would acquire a package of bacon that tastes almost authentic, like it actually came from one of the pig farms on the outskirts of Beta.  Eggs he can reason.  There are neighborhoods as far down as Delta where people keep ranges for chickens.  They’re cheap and easy enough to come by, though no one lower than Beta would ever be able to afford a breeding stock.  Actual bacon, however – in fact, actual meat – is another matter entirely.  He hasn’t had anything that’s tasted so unprocessed since his parents had left him to rot.

Cosette returns, bearing a fresh plate for herself along with the promised coffee and Marius pauses his eating to clear his throat.  “So, uh, while you were sleeping, we all did a little bit of planning.  Courf figured you wouldn’t mind as long as we kept you in the loop.”

Enjolras raises his cup to his lips and takes in a deep breath through his nose, savoring the smell for a moment before nodding.  “Fill me in.”

Tapping his fork against his plate, Marius returns the nod before he starts talking.  “Well, first off, we found the old civilian clinic and moved Joly down there.  He’s planning on putting together an inventory once he’s sure they’ve dealt with everybody’s injuries.”

“You should have seen his face when he found the store room down there,” Cosette puts in.

Marius laughs.  “I know, right?  Like it was his birthday or something.  I mean, most of the stuff in there is ancient but it’s better than nothing.”  He takes another bite of his eggs.  “Aside from that, Feuilly and Bossuet got one of the old trams working downstairs and I think they’ve started putting teams together to sort of clean the place up and make it habitable again.  Bahorel went back up to Delta with Eponine and Gavroche to scout things out, see what the Precinct is up to, if we can start scavenging yet or what, and—”

When he cuts off, Marius simply makes eye contact with Cosette, looking a little bit nervous.  With a hum, she reaches across the table to clasp his free hand and continues the briefing for him.  “They’re going to try to get into the Musain.  If they can get to the virus and get it back here, Jehan is going to start going through the code to see if he can complete it.”  Her expression is strong, almost stoic, save for the flash of sympathy behind her eyes.  “It may be more difficult without Combeferre but Feuilly is sure they can manage.”

Enjolras doesn’t let himself visibly react to the statement but suddenly he doesn’t feel particularly hungry.  “They can and they will.”  He sips at his coffee, forces himself to take a few more bites of food.  When he sets his fork down, he barely manages to bite back a frustrated sigh.  “Have either of you seen Grantaire?”

A few moments later, coffee in hand, Enjolras is making his way down the corridor on the opposite side of the kitchen from the barracks where he’d slept.  There’s only one open door that he can see, which makes his goal fairly obvious, and he strides toward it without hesitation.  Everything changes, however, when he finds himself freezing, awestruck, before he can even step inside.

“What is this?”

Sat by the wall, brush in hand, Grantaire stops for only a split second to glance back over his shoulder before he focuses himself upon his work once again.  “Reality.”

It takes some time for Enjolras to find the will to move.  Even then his step is light, tentative, as he makes his way to the center of the room, the center of the aerial landscape that he can only assume must be an honest depiction of Zeta.  He can’t even begin to take in the amount of detail below him, above him, around him.  Still, he tries, slowly turning in place to view everything – their entire world – in panorama.  “I knew that you were an artist,” he admits, voice low, “but this?  Grantaire, this is—”

“My life’s work.”

There is a pause, pure silence, then a sigh as R drops his brush into the cup that sits beside him, all of his supplies carefully placed upon a square of plastic sheeting.  It keeps the floor safe from spills and splatters and smudges of paint.  He’s used nothing, however, to do the same for himself.  His hair is damp, the only sign left of his recent bathing, and his clothing may be newly washed but are far from clean.  When Grantaire wipes his hand off on his thigh, Enjolras finds himself momentarily distracted by the bright contrast of white paint on dark, faded denim.

“You still need a shower.”  The artist sits a moment longer before shoving himself to his feet with some effort and Enjolras can only imagine the difficulty of it, given his own aching limbs.  He finds a slight frown tugging at his lips, though Grantaire doesn’t seem to notice.  “Probably want some clean clothes, too.”  R brushes by, makes his way out the door.  “Come on.  You can waste your time staring at the world later.”

Enjolras shakes his head and follows a moment later.

Further down the hall, R brings them to a cross way which connects the opposing corridors and offers a stair to the upper level.  They take the steps side-by-side in silence and Enjolras only pauses for a beat in order to allow his companion to control their direction at the top.  The lights flicker on by motion sensor, though half of the bulbs are dead and most of those that remain are barely still struggling to live, and they are met by more artwork, catching the eye in flashing lights and swirls of color, pieces of portraits and disjointed scenery.  It is an oddly familiar style, somewhat surreal, combining living detail with swaths of wild abstraction, and Enjolras takes a moment to realize where he has seen it before.  Most recently, he has barely taken the time to notice the way that it covers the walls of the parade ground.  Contrasting curves and stark lines forming and breaking words and images has been such a common sight for so long that he has since taken for granted the way that they also adorn the interior of the Musain, peek out of Delta’s darkest corners, slither under window frames and arch over doorways.

“You’ve left your mark everywhere, haven’t you?”

Grantaire’s only answer is a twitch of a smile before leading him into the General’s suite.

“Already brought some clean towels up,” R says, flicking a hand toward the open bathroom door as he moves toward his wardrobe.  “Just so you know, water heater’s kind of shit.  You get hot water or you get water pressure.  Do with that what you will.  I’ll dig up something you can actually wear.”

Enjolras hesitates for a moment before squeezing Grantaire’s shoulder in thanks and disappearing into the adjacent space.

When he catches sight of himself in the mirror, it is, at first, surprising.  He can barely recognize the vaguely haggard expression, cutting folds and creases into his features with the gathering of dirt and dust and the thin scrape of stiff hairs gathering on his unshaven jaw.  Leaning in toward his own reflection, he studies familiar scars and fresher scratches, dark circles like angry bruises and the fleck of white hairs that he can rarely tell apart from the blond.  Today he both looks and feels beyond his own age and he supposes that it is appropriate, though he doubts it would do much for morale if he were to so remain.  With the pressure turned high and temperature just above freezing, he wakes himself further as he scrubs himself clean before turning the heat up to soothe some of his aching and allowing himself to relax into the steam.

How long he lets himself enjoy such a luxury, he isn’t certain.  Temperature control, with or without pressure, is a commodity not easily afforded below Beta and, though he and his friends could likely find money enough for it, they have always had more important uses for their income.  Not long ago, Bahorel and Feuilly had begun collecting scrap and broken electronics in order to build and install their own homemade versions of otherwise unattainable amenities, such as localized water heaters, filtration systems, and proper air regulators.  All they had ever asked of those who would benefit from the gifts was assistance in acquiring more parts.  They had successfully provided for two buildings before all of this and now?  Now, Enjolras reminds himself, most of those people are hiding in an abandoned, underground city, cleaning up and rebuilding their own new world two floors below.

He wipes the steam from the mirror with the corner of his towel before wrapping the threadbare fabric around his waist in some flimsy attempt at decency and stares at his reflection as he had before.  His face looks less drawn now, rid of the grit and grime that had emphasized every line before, but he still looks far scruffier than he would like.  Two days unshaven is nothing for him when he is steadily working, confined to his study to focus upon the final stages of their next plan, but it is uncomfortably unprofessional at times when he knows that he will soon be facing the public.  His fingers trail the bristle of his jawline with a grimace twisting his lips.

“Left drawer.”

Enjolras has to grip the sink with both hands to keep his feet from slipping as he starts with a hiss.  “Jesus Christ, Grantaire.”

His host’s grin is broad and cheeky and astoundingly familiar.  “Sorry.  Razor and all, though.  Left drawer.”  Then he’s ducked out and that grin is still audible in the sing-song of his voice from the next room.  “After all, wouldn’t want to look too human, now, would you?”

There is an instant in which Enjolras almost considers not shaving just to make a point.

R isn’t in the bedroom when his guest finally finishes but he’s left a modest selection of relatively neat and unmarred clothing draped over the foot of the bed.  A pair of underwear lie on top and, given any other situation, the thought of wearing another man’s skivvies might be irritating, possibly even embarrassing.  As it is, Enjolras almost finds himself impressed that Grantaire owns anything, let alone something not regularly visible, that isn’t either covered in stains or full of holes.  The black slacks laid out with them are in the fashion of standard issue military dress from days long gone, tailored for someone approximately Enjolras’s height, though not his build, and they fit well enough once he’s washed the dried muck off of his belt.  There’s a white t-shirt as well, just a bit too small, but he can’t find room to complain when he discovers that it is both clean and entirely intact.  In fact, the socks he’s been left seem almost new.  The boots, again military standard, are a bit scuffed but otherwise unblemished.

Only the hoodie, a well-worn zip-up meant for someone with slightly broader shoulders, is in any way marked as having seen use in well over a century and it, too, has at least been recently washed.  When he pulls it on against the subterranean chill which replaces the dissipating warmth of the shower, there is no lingering smell of wine where the sleeve is stained from burgundy to black, no smoke where the hood is singed, no hint of bleach and turpentine in the old splatters of paint and peroxide.  It is something like wearing a piece of Grantaire’s artwork and, honestly, the offer of that rather than some final piece of a long dead soldier’s uniform is touching in a way that Enjolras is not entirely certain he possesses the means to describe.

At the very end of the corridor, beyond the entrances to two more, similarly styled suites, he finds Grantaire leaned back against a set of double doors.  This is another security check point.  To one side is a window, chicken wire set between two panes of glass to separate them from the dark and dusty guard station beyond.  To the other is a machine, its base set into the wall and its face dangling at the end of tangled wires.  R drops a cigarette butt on the floor and grinds it out under his boot.

“Feel better?”

Enjolras nods with a quiet hum.  “Thank you.”  _For the clothing, for the shower, for the food, for opening your home, for saving my life—_   “For everything.”

There’s a faint laugh, tucked away behind dark hair, bright eyes under low lashes, and Grantaire turns away to lift the hanging keypad.  “Careful there, sunshine.  That’s a pretty broad range of gratitude.”  He taps at the numbers with his thumb and the doors shudder to life with a quiet groan that echoes, amplifies, becomes thunder when they slam into their open position and R glances back with an expression that is at once calculating and exhausted.  “I’ve got something to show you.”

When he moves forward, under the flickering fluorescence of the hall ahead, he doesn’t look to see if he’s being followed.  The latches release and the doors creak shut.  By the time they slam into place, Enjolras has fallen into step beside him.

It’s a short walk from there, one made in heavy silence as Enjolras watches his companion from the corner of his eye.  Grantaire stares straight ahead, eyes distant and jaw set, an almost nervous tension in the square of his shoulders.  Letting him lead the way without any real distance between them comes more easily now than it had before, and they turn left, right, stop as the motion sensor hesitates to bring the ceiling lamps spluttering into life.  Enjolras stands in the darkness of the doorway, feeling the brush of an arm against his elbow, and briefly finds himself wondering at how quickly and easily he has come to trust this man after so many years of nothing between them save frustration and argument and outrage.

Then the light catches the colors along the far wall and all such thoughts are gracelessly blown from his mind.

Moving across the room, steps slow and steady as if the paint might fear him and melt away, Enjolras is vaguely aware that Grantaire has disappeared through another doorway somewhere off to his right.  There are more important observations crowding into the temporarily emptied spaces of his mind, however, and he is far too busy attempting to catalogue them all for anything else to matter.  Blue eyes and blond hair, his own face stares back at him, acrylic brushed over a warning sign, life sized and in intricate detail.  Lined up beside it and beneath it, distances between them making an almost perfect grid, the others are there, too – Combeferre and Courfeyrac to his right, followed by Bahorel and Feuilly, with the rest the next row down, starting with Joly to the left and working its way to Cosette.  His fingers trace along the scribbled words that surround each portrait like a character sketch, notes taken on who they are and how they move and where they stand.  Some of it is readily available information, some personal observation, and some facts that Combeferre had scrubbed from the Precinct records long ago.

The sight leaves a knot in his gut, a knot which rises toward his chest as he slowly turns to find Grantaire staring, seemingly impassive, sat on the other side of a long, plate glass window.  Fingertips tapping against the console beside him are the only sign of agitation and Enjolras hesitates, breathes in deeply, cautiously steps through the open door beside him.  R leans to one side but does not look away as he flips a switch and speaks into a nearby microphone, all too clearly.

“Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, this is your Radio Bomb.”

Enjolras isn’t sure exactly if he falls or just sits down.


End file.
